Black Sheep
by NAYLEV
Summary: The son of a Death Eater, Alexander is looking forward to going to Hogwarts. But how will Hogwarts treat him when they realise just who his parents are?


**Black Sheep**

Alex lugged his trunk onto the train and turned to look back at his grandmother, but she had already gone, her place taken by hundreds of parents clamouring to say goodbye to their offspring. Not surprised, he picked up his trunk again and set off down the train, looking for an empty compartment.

Alex was eleven, a young boy of average appearance, if slightly skinny. Brown eyes could be seen underneath a mop of untidy dark blond hair, the sort of hair that was messy, but looked good in spite of it. His clothes were a little on the large size, as if whoever had given them to him had allowed room for growth. There was nothing special to draw attention to him, the way he liked it. Alex much preferred being on his own.

It didn't look like he was going to get that on this particular journey though. He passed compartment after compartment after compartment, dragging his trunk behind him. Each and every one was crammed full of overexcited kids, sharing stories of the holidays, showing off souvenirs. Finally Alex reached the very end of the train where he found a compartment with only two passengers, a scrawny boy with black hair and glasses that looked as though they were held together with sellotape, wearing clothes that were ludicrously big for him, and another lankier boy, with violently red hair and freckles covering his face. Alex suspected the latter was a Weasley, from discussions he had heard between his uncle and his grandmother. They had spoken about the Weasleys very unpleasantly, but Alex had long ago learnt that his family looked down on most people, whether that was right or not, Alex didn't know.

It was not ideal, but it was better than nothing as it was obvious that he was not going to get a compartment to himself. Swallowing nervously, he stuck his head round the door.

"'Scuse me, but you don't mind if I sit in here do you, only everywhere else is crammed full?"

The boys looked up, frowning. "Yeah sure," the black haired one gestured with a wave of his hand. Alex heaved his trunk onto the luggage rack and sat down opposite the red head, who spoke next,

"I'm Ron Weasley, is this your first time too?" Alex had barely nodded when the other boy next to him started speaking,

"And I'm Harry Potter, but you haven't told us your name?"

"You're Harry Potter!" Alex's brain dimly registered that he was sitting next to one of the most famous boys in the wizarding world.

"Yeah, I expect I'm going to get a lot of that." He looked pretty miserable at the prospect, so Alex decided it would be best to answer the question.

"Oh yeah, I'm Alex. Full name's Alexander, but I only get called that by my gran or when I'm in trouble." They looked at him curiously, and Alex thought he knew why. He was very reluctant to tell anyone his last name, and, knowing it would come out eventually, chose to ignore the inquiring looks.

"I bet I'm going to be miles behind, I don't know anything about magic or anything," Harry looked very anxious about it, but before Alex could even open his mouth to reassure him, Ron had responded.

"Don't worry about it, my brothers told me that there are loads of people from muggle families, and they cope just fine, don't worry about it."

"Yeah, I don't have any siblings, but all my family who have been said the same thing, you'll be absolutely fine" Alex knew that most of his family were actually extremely disapproving of witches and wizards from muggle families, even going so far as to suggest they should not be allowed to go to Hogwarts. As that was not his own view on the matter, Alex decided not to bother mentioning that bit; it probably wouldn't be very helpful.

Harry looked more upbeat at that. "I wish I had three wizarding brothers"

"Five" said Ron gloomily "You saw Percy and the twins on the platform, and Bill and Charlie have left Hogwarts now. It's not all that great though. Bill was Head Boy, Charlie was Quidditch captain, Percy's a prefect, and even though the twins mess around all the time, they still get top grades. I'm supposed to live up to all that. You never get anything new either, I've got Charlie's old wand, and Percy's old rat, Mum and Dad got him a new owl now he's a prefect" Ron looked over to his side, and picked up a rat that Alex had not noticed before. "He's dead boring though, he's always asleep. Fred gave me spell the other day to turn him yellow, but I don't think it worked. Knowing Fred, it probably wasn't even a real spell"

"Go on, let's see it anyway" Alex encouraged Ron, even if it wasn't a real spell it would still be a laugh. Harry looked on with interest. Alex knew he had grown up with muggles, and magic was probably still a novelty to him, not having seen much before. Ron pulled out his wand, frowning at it,

"Unicorn hair's sticking out of the end, look." Alex looked at the battered and chipped wand, and saw something glinting at the end of it that could indeed be unicorn hair.

Ron cleared his throat and raised his wand. At that moment the door slid open and a girl with very bushy hair and rather prominent front teeth, already wearing her school robes, entered, "You haven't seen a toad have you? Neville's lost his." Shaking his head Alex looked past the girl and saw a round-faced, chubby boy waiting anxiously behind the girl. He found himself hoping the girl would leave as something about her was already getting on his nerves. However it was not to be, she had spotted Ron and his wand. "You're not doing magic are you? I want to see it," she commanded bossily.

Ron rolled his eyes, but carried on anyway. Clearing his throat again, he took aim at the rat. "Sunshine daisy, butter mellow, turn this stupid fat rat yellow!"

Nothing happened, and Ron picked up the rat by the tail for a closer examination, looking disappointed. "Are you sure that's a real spell? I've tried out a few little spells from the textbooks at home, and they've all worked for me. None of my family are magical, I've learnt all the course books off by heart of course, I just hope it'll be enough. What house do you want to be in? Gryffindor sounds by far the best, Dumbledore was in it and everything, but I wouldn't mind being in Ravenclaw." She said all this very fast, Alex just looked at the others in shock, but before anyone could say anything, she started again. "I'm Hermione Granger by the way, who are you?"

"Ron Weasley"

"Harry Potter"

Alex was spared having to answer when she gave a little squeal of excitement "You're not Harry Potter, are you? I've read about you!"

"You've read about me?" Harry spluttered.

"Well of course I have. I bought some extra books for background reading, and you're in loads of them, how you defeated You-Know-Who," she explained excitedly.

"Oh, that's, that's nice" stuttered Harry finally.

"Anyway, we have to look for Neville's toad. See you later." Turning to leave she beckoned to Neville, who, with a scared look on his face, followed her out of the compartment.

Alex was lost in thought. She had said she was a muggleborn, and although he was determined to be more open-minded than the rest of his family, he hoped that Hermione was not representative of all muggleborns; she was extremely annoying and condescending. He had only known her for five minutes and already that was more than enough.

"I haven't learnt the course books, have you?" Harry's worried voice broke into his reverie. He and Ron quickly shook their heads in response.

"Nah, she's just one of those annoying nerdy types that'd eat the textbook if they thought they would learn more from it," he said. "Tell you what though, I seriously hope I'm not in her house, whichever one that may be. I'd end up throwing myself off a tower within the week."

"House?" Harry questioned. It was a bit odd, Alex thought. The saviour of the wizarding world didn't know the first thing about it. It wasn't his fault, but that didn't stop it feeling weird.

Ron took it up. "Yeah, there are four; Gryffindor, Ravenclaw, Hufflepuff, and of course Slytherin." Alex noted the look of distaste on his face as he mentioned the last one. "You get sorted into one, and they all compete against each other for points. Apparently it gets very competitive, especially over Quidditch. My whole family's been in Gryffindor, I don't want to know what they'd do if I don't end up there."

"I'm sure you'll be fine, compared to what my family would do to me if I don't get put in the house they want," Alex muttered darkly, it was not an attractive prospect. "They've all been sorted into Slytherin, and most of them deserve it too."

"Seriously, and I thought you seemed alright enough to me!" Ron smiled encouragingly. "Well at least there's a black sheep in every family, it could be you."

"Yeah, I can but hope." Alex noticed that Harry wanted to ask more, but at the precise moment he moment he opened his mouth, a plump kindly-looking lady stuck her head round the door.

"Anything from the trolley dears?"

Alex and Harry both jumped to their feet, while Ron gestured sadly at his very squashed sandwiches. Alex didn't have much money, his grandmother didn't seem to think he deserved much at all, but sweets at home were such a rarity he didn't care about saving any of it.

He quickly bought a couple of pumpkin pasties and a chocolate frog. Meanwhile Harry was staring open mouthed at the trolley. "What's the matter, never seen anything like this before?"

"No, I was expecting Mars Bars or Dairy Milks, not whatever these are," he said as he gestured hopelessly at the trolley.

"Well, you won't find any of those muggle sweets here. I'm not going to tell you which ones you should buy, try them for yourself."

They staggered back into the compartment a few minutes later carrying armfuls of sweets, Harry having eventually decided to buy a few of everything. "Did you buy the whole trolley or something?" Ron picked wistfully at his sandwiches. "Corned beef again. I've told her I hate it, but I suppose it's not her fault, with there being so many of us."

"Here," Harry chucked a Chocolate Frog at him. Despite his surprise Ron somehow caught it, but didn't open it, just sat there. "What?" questioned Harry, "just have whatever you want. I've got plenty. That goes for you too Alex."

Alex smiled his thanks, but rather than dive into the mountain of sweets, started on his own first.

"What are these?" asked Harry, holding up a Chocolate Frog. "They're not real are they?"

"Nah, but watch you don't let it escape," replied Alex, watching with some amusement as Harry was inevitably caught out and the frog made its escape down the corridor. "Tough luck, I suppose the chocolate doesn't do that where you're from."

Harry was still staring at the spot where the frog had disappeared. "No, no it doesn't." He picked up the wrapper and made to throw it onto the already large pile of rubbish. "Hey, what's this on the back?"

Alex glanced over. "Oh they all come with cards, each with a famous witch or wizard on them. You're supposed to collect them, but I've never bothered personally. Let's see who you've got." Harry held out the card for Alex to see.

_Albus Dumbledore, currently Headmaster of Hogwarts_

_Considered by many the greatest wizard of modern_

_times, Professor Dumbledore is particularly famous for_

_his defeat of the dark wizard Grindelwald in 1945,_

_for the discovery of the twelve uses of dragon's_

_blood and his work on alchemy with his partner,_

_Nicholas Flamel. Professor Dumbledore enjoys_

_music and tenpin bowling._

"So _that's_ Dumbledore" said Harry

"Don't tell me you've never heard of Dumbledore!" exclaimed Ron, eyeing up the pile of Chocolate Frogs

"Go on Ron, have as many as you want. It seems like there's going to be a lot of things I've never heard of. I mean, what's the Quidditch thing that everyone keeps going on about?"

"Quidditch is the best sport ever. I suppose it's a bit like the way the muggles have football..." Alex let Ron explain it all to Harry, occasionally joining in to add a little bit of information, He didn't doubt that Ron could explain it better, as although Alex was a keen follower of the game, his grandmother had never allowed him near a broom, let alone fly one. "...And there's a league too," Ron was still going, "have you got a team Alex?

"Yeah, the Magpies, I've liked them since I was little."

"Hmm," smirked Ron, "I would accuse you of only liking them because they win, but I suppose it does fit with your accent. I'm a Cannons fan myself."

"Well there's definitely no chance of you being a fair weather fan then," chuckled Alex. The Cannons were bottom of the league and had been for many years now, whereas the Magpies were the most successful team in the league's history.

Ron was just starting on the finer parts of the game when the compartment door slid open again and three boys entered. Alex barely managed to hold back a groan, for the pale boy in the middle was none other than his cousin, a boy who had delighted in making life absolutely miserable for Alex every time one was sent to stay with the other. Unfortunately for Alex this had happened far too often, as his grandmother was very keen to get him out of her house and so he had been packed off to his aunt and uncle, often for weeks at a time. His cousin was flanked by two huge boys who almost looked like they were being paid to act as bodyguards. Alex wouldn't have been surprised if they actually were, knowing just how overprotective his aunt and uncle were.

"Is it true?" he said. "They're saying all down the train that the famous Harry Potter was in here, so it's you is it?"

"Yeah, that's me, and who are you?" asked Harry almost aggressively. He didn't seem to appreciate that air of superiority.

"Crabbe, and Goyle." He gestured carelessly at the two boys either side of him. "And I'm Draco Malfoy."

Ron gave a slight snigger that he hastily disguised as a cough. It wasn't fooling anyone though, least of all Draco.

Draco glared at Ron. "Think I've got a funny name do you?" Alex silently agreed with Ron. Draco was a pretty stupid name. "There's no need to ask you your name. Red hair, freckles, and more children than they can afford. You're obviously a Weasley," he retorted scathingly. He then turned to Harry. "You'll soon find that some families are much better than others Potter. I can help stop you making friends with the wrong sort." He held out his hand, but Harry didn't take it.

"You know, I reckon I can work out who the right sort are for myself thanks."

Alex smiled, but Draco was getting angry. He didn't go red, he was far too pale for that, but his cheeks went pink, a clear warning sign.

"You know Potter, if you hang around with riff-raff like Hagrid and the Weasleys it'll rub off on you. You'll go the same way as your parents."

He had gone too far now. As Harry and Ron both stood up, looking absolutely livid, Alex decided it was time to intervene.

"Just leave it Draco, do you really want to start a fight now?"

"I must say I am surprised to see you here Alexander." He emphasised every syllable of the name, sneering as he did so. "You'll end up in Gryffindor if you carry on at this rate, you seem quite happy to be associating with blood traitors and the like. I wonder what your mother would do if she found out?"

"You and I both know that my mother can do absolutely nothing to me Draco." It was true, Alex was however more concerned about what the rest of his family would do to him if, and it was a huge if, the chances of Alex staying out of Slytherin were extremely slim, he was sorted into Gryffindor.

"Well just be careful. I'm sure you're completely aware of what happens to Black sheep, if you catch my drift." Alex knew exactly what Draco was getting at. There hadn't been many black sheep in their family, but the ones that hadn't been afraid to be different had been cast out, disowned, never to see their family again.

"Crabbe, Goyle, let's go, let's not waste any more time on this lot." Draco haughtily left the compartment, taking his two goons with him.

"Well he seemed lovely, I can't say I'm sorry to see him go." Ron had stood to close the door. "Stupid Malfoys, lording it over the rest of us just because they have money."

"Alex, did you know him, it seemed like you'd already met before?" questioned Harry curiously.

He grimaced. "Yes. I have the misfortune to be his cousin, I've known him my whole life."

"Tough luck." It was Ron's turn to sympathise. "I 'spose we don't get to choose our family though."

Alex said nothing, but merely smiled his thanks. Ron was right, but he did wish that his family wasn't all like Malfoy. However, with the exception of those that had been disowned, they all were, all believing that they were superior to everyone just because of who they were.

Harry had turned to look out the window. "You know, I reckon the train's slowing down. We must nearly be there." His voice was almost shaking with excitement. "Do you think we should get our robes on now?"

"Yeah, we probably should."

After much rummaging and scrabbling in trunks, all three of them finally managed to extricate their robes and get changed into them. Alex couldn't help but notice that Ron's were patched and grey with age and wear. He knew exactly what Malfoy would be thinking right now.

The train grew slower and slower, finally coming to a stop alongside the platform. A voice echoed over the tannoy. "Please leave your luggage on the train, it will be taken to the school separately."

The doors opened, and with the excitement building, the three boys stepped down onto the platform together.


End file.
